By Myself and Then Some (13 page)

A couple of days later Diana Vreeland called and asked if I could come in the next Tuesday to pose. I had the weekend ahead of me – to rest up and talk about this until I drove everyone mad. My mother always said, ‘The trouble with you is you have a one-track mind. When you make up your mind about one thing, you erase everything else.’ But Tuesday came at last and off I went. Mrs Wolfe was there – and Mrs Vreeland. She put a suit on me, told me which make-up to use – but very little. ‘Betty, I don’t want to change your look.’ (Whatever
that
was.) When all was done she put a scarf round my neck – knew just how to tie it, a little off-center – and I was ready for my first sitting for
Harper’s Bazaar
. From that day on, my life would take a different course.

It was fun working with those two ladies. Diana would be there through the sitting, making sure the clothes were on straight, that the hair was the way she wanted it. Louise would snap away. They worked perfectly together.

I’d say almost anything that came into my head – about acting, the theatre, my being an usher. A lot of it made them laugh – though all through it, Dahl-Wolfe never looked up from the camera, never really took her mind off what she was doing. A total professional. I asked what issue the pictures might be in – they thought probably January. Almost two months ahead – that was the way those magazines worked.

The pictures were okay, I was told. Good enough to use. Then things
began to move. I posed in glorious apartments – one was Helena Rubinstein’s; on a bathtub in a one-piece jersey undergarment looking over my shoulder; on a sofa in a jumpsuit (a jumpsuit in 1942!); sewing; standing by a window in a slip; wearing hats in an antique shop; in a printer’s shop. I loved being with Louise and Diana – felt comfortable – and I was getting paid ten dollars an hour.

Once I was sent to Hoyningen-Huené, one of the great fashion photographers of the day. His work methods could not have been more different from Dahl-Wolfe’s. I was standing in a tailored suit; he posed me like a statue. ‘Put your left foot forward a bit – turn the toe out – shoulders straight and out front – head down, a little to the right. Hold very still.’ Agony, every part of my body was going in a different direction. Whenever he said, ‘Hold still,’ I started to shake. I was a disaster. He was not pleased.
I
was not pleased. Not pleased? I was suffering. I hated him. The tenser I became, the more strained my facial expression. ‘I’ll never work again – I couldn’t be a model, not this kind of model.’ I was not a mannequin. Somehow the sitting came to a close. I doubted that Huené had got even one picture he could use. Certainly I’d never work for him again – wait till Diana Vreeland heard from him! I wanted to tell her first, but didn’t feel secure enough with her; I’d just have to wait and see what happened. Years later I met Georges Huené again at George Cukor’s house and reminded him of that day. He turned out to be a very pleasant man, and we laughed about my fright and my inability to cope. We could then – it was over for both of us.

Diana asked me if I could go to St Augustine, Florida, for two weeks of pictures for the May issue. She’d take another girl along – Eileen McLory, a nice girl and good model whom I knew a little – and Dahl-Wolfe. Would I ask my mother? Diana would be happy to explain it all to her.

I was excited – I’d never been to St Augustine, the oldest, and one of the quaintest cities in America. I rushed to tell Mother, who, of course, was pleased for me but who, of course, wanted to be assured by Mrs Vreeland that I would be well looked after. There was a war on, St Augustine was on the sea, and there’d be a lot of servicemen around. Still so protected at eighteen. My old-fashioned mother. She spoke with Mrs Vreeland and, having had her fears and apprehensions put to rest, agreed that I could go.

So I packed for my first location work – it was the first week in December and we’d be returning to New York by the 20th or 21st. We boarded the train – Diana Vreeland, Louise Dahl-Wolfe, and her husband, Mike, Eileen McLory and myself, plus boxes of film, reflectors, Louise’s cameras. Everything very compactly put together for travel. All pictures were to be shot outside in natural light, so we’d have to start early in the morning.

In Florida the air was balmy, palm trees everywhere, tropical in feeling, so different from New York. We arrived at the recommended hotel, which turned out to be the ninth-best hotel in St Augustine. It and all the others were being taken over by the Seabees. Eileen and I shared one room. Diana had hers – the Wolfes theirs. The town was charming – horses and carriages, great, burly, friendly black men with top hats driving them. The place had not been spoiled by what is laughingly known as progress – all the old torn down to make way for the new, the shiny, the ugly.

I remember going into Diana Vreeland’s room one evening as she was sitting in her one-piece undergarment – not a girdle, it was all easy, like thin knitted cotton or wool. She was rolling her hair with eau de cologne – she found it dried quickly, worked well. We talked of how the work was going. I talked more of my ambitions, my dreams. We talked of the hotel. More Seabees were moving in – she said to pay no attention to the young freckled-faced porter who seemed drunk on sherry. Eileen and I were not to wander around on our own, especially as the evening approached.

The work was finally done and we were to leave the next evening on the night train for New York. Diana told me I was to pretend to be her pregnant daughter – that was the only way we’d got our tickets, because servicemen had priority. I didn’t know until years later that she’d been sitting in the hotel bar near the president of the railroad and overheard his name. And the next day she’d walked two and a half miles in the rain to the train station and told her sad story to someone there – her little girl was going to have a baby; the railroad president, a good friend, had told her to mention his name when necessary, and of course she realized the Armed Forces had priority – there was a war on – there were five of us – it was
so
important for her little girl. Talk of acting – what a character! She got the tickets. They must have bumped someone. All Diana knew was that she’d told my mother she’d
get me back and that’s what she aimed to do. That’s why she flourished. Talent – her gift of creativity – is not enough – determintion, perseverance, resolution, that’s what makes the difference.

It was a very funny scene. The train jammed with servicemen heading home for Christmas, not too many civilians in sight. Our group boarding the train – me leaning on Diana for benefit of porters, conductors, God knows who – playing the death scene from
Camille –
trying to be brave – feeling a bit faint – where did I ever get that idea of pregnancy? Diana saying, ‘There, there, dear. Take it easy now, you have to rest.’ Not the best acting I’d ever seen – we were both overdoing it. Finally got into a seat – berths were going to be made up before dinner or during. Dinner was a mess. As the train was so jammed, we didn’t dare leave all the seats untended, so I sat in my ‘weakened’ condition while Diana and Eileen scrounged for food. Diana could certainly function. She did what had to be done. No wonder she had so much clout in the fashion-magazine world. They came up with something finally – enough – and word was passing through the train that Martha Raye was in the club car entertaining the servicemen. She had been traveling overseas to do that. I was dying to see her – anybody connected with show business gave me a boost. I was determined to get to that club car. Diana was determined that I shouldn’t – ‘Remember you are not very well, Betty – you must think of the baby.’ We might be put off the train at any stop if we were discovered. ‘I need to get my mind off myself for a while, Mother.’ I got to that club car. Martha Raye was sitting with a drink in her hand, talking to everyone in the car, cracking jokes, singing songs. I huddled in a corner and never took my eyes off her until finally, not to press my luck, I consented to go back to the berth with Diana. It must have been about two in the morning when I got to bed, being carefully and noisily, for the porters’ benefit, tucked in by my ‘mother.’

The January issue of
Harper’s Bazaar
was on the stands at the end of December and many copies were sold to the Bacalls and Weinsteins of the world. Only one picture, but it was my first in a national magazine and everyone cared about that. There would be more in the February issue. Diana had told me I’d be very happy with those. I had posed in white blouses. It was to be a double-page spread – the other models were Martha Scott, who’d had a great success in
Our Town
, and Margaret Hayes, a promising young actress.

In January I posed in a blue suit with an off-the-face hat, standing before a window with ‘American Red Cross Blood Donor Service’ lettered on it. It was a color picture and would be a full page.

Mid-January Diana showed me the February issue of
Bazaar
. There on the double-page spread of the two actresses and me in blouses, alongside one of my pictures was printed: ‘Worn by the young actress, Betty Becall’ (my name misspelled, but who cared?).

I almost fainted, I was so happy. I hugged Diana – hugged everyone in sight. You’d have thought my name was up in lights – it
was
my name, in print, even spelled wrong, and that would do for the time being.

About mid-February Diana called my mother to tell her there were stacks of letters on her desk asking who I was and where I could be reached. She said, ‘Listen, Mrs Bacall, I think Betty’s too young to make these decisions, so I’m sending it all on to you.’ Diana was always terrific to me and about me. She was so smart, had such wisdom. Also it turned out that the Blood Donor picture was going to be on the March cover. The cover! I couldn’t believe it when I heard; there’d be no living with me now.

Mother showed all the letters she thought might be important to my Uncle Jack. He did represent
Look
magazine – he was the wisest lawyer in the family for business and the entertainment world. Charlie was involved in city-government law.

There was an inquiry from David O. Selznick’s office. Someone who worked for him had told him there was this girl who looked something like K. T. Stevens, whom he had discovered – he ought to take a look at her, possibly test her. They asked for more photographs of me. Then Howard Hughes had made an inquiry. Jack felt we should move very carefully on all this. Obviously there’d be other inquiries as a result of the
Bazaar
cover, let’s work slowly, wait awhile. He talked to Mother first before I heard anything, wanting to make sure she understood it all. He also knew I’d be so hysterical that I might accept the first offer made, not knowing anything about the movie world.

An appointment was made with Selznick – not with him personally, since he was in California, but with his number-one man. I went to the man’s office, talked with him for a while, gave him what little history there was of my no accomplishments. The interview didn’t last long
about half an hour. Mr Selznick would be given all this information together with photographs and I’d hear from them.

Columbia Pictures was making a movie starring Rita Hayworth – title,
Cover Girl
. An inquiry came from Columbia Pictures – there were going to be eight or ten actual cover girls in the film. Would I be the
Harper’s Bazaar
cover girl? The catch was – isn’t there always a catch? – Columbia insisted on my signing a year’s contract with options in case they wanted to use me in something else.

At the same time there was another inquiry. Howard Hawks wanted to know about me. One day in the
Look
office Jack and I sat down and talked it all out. I had never heard of Howard Hawks. Jack had, and listed his movies. He had directed some really outstanding films, including
Twentieth Century, Only Angels Have Wings, Air Force, Bringing Up Baby
. Charles K. Feldman, his agent and partner, wanted to know if I would come to California to make a screen test – it would mean staying in California for six to eight weeks. If they liked the test, Hawks would sign me to a personal contract.

All of these offers were from unknown people – unknown to me – who lived in an unknown place. This was the first design in a pattern of work that was to continue all my life. Either everything at once or nothing – feast or famine. One had to say ‘yes’ to one, ‘no’ to all the others. I had no way of knowing, nor did Jack really, and certainly Mother didn’t, how to make the right choice.

Diana Vreeland and Carmel Snow were more than happy about the Columbia offer. They wanted me to be the
Harper’s Bazaar
cover girl. I told Diana of the Hawks offer. She said, ‘Of course you must do what is best for you. We would adore it if you’d represent us in the movie biz, but if you must accept his offer, you must.’

Charles Feldman, representing Hawks, had called Jack several times. They would pay me fifty dollars a week until the test was made. If they liked me, they would draw up a contract and pay me more. But I had to decide about coming to California. Jack told him there were other offers to be considered and a great deal of interest in me. Feldman was very articulate about Hawks and very persuasive.

After we had talked it over again, Jack said, ‘Look, if you accept the Columbia offer, you will be in a movie. There will be lots of other girls in that movie. And if Columbia decides to, they can pick up your option and keep you for at least a year or even seven years. That’s the
standard Hollywood contract length. If you accept the Feldman-Hawks offer, you will make a screen test which Hawks will direct. If he likes you, he will sign you to a personal contract. It seems to me that with Hawks’ record and reputation you’d be better off going with him. He’d give you personal care and you’d know very quickly whether he liked you enough to keep you out there or not.’ I thought about that – remembered
Bringing Up Baby
and
Only Angels Have Wings
and how good they were – and agreed with Jack. Better to have care taken by one director than to be one of ten cover girls with maybe one or two lines to speak. I’d never be noticed in a movie with Rita Hayworth and those other really beautiful, professional models. Not with
my
face.